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Shawn is a Senior Staff Writer at Complex and the host of The Cipher, a critically acclaimed hip-hop podcast that conducts in-depth interviews with the genre’s most interesting and important figures.

Shawn is also the former editor-in-chief of Rap Genius, and has written about music and culture for Forbes, The Atlantic, Vibe, The Source, GQ, Esquire, The Sondheim Review, and more.

Nov 30, 2017

Image via Showoff Records/Duck Down

Statik Selektah said that his 2015 album Lucky 7 was going to be his last. Luckily for fans of classic-sounding hip-hop everywhere, he changed his mind.

Statik's new album 8 is coming out on Dec. 8—you can pre-order it here. In anticipation, Complex is happy to premiere one of the album's standout tracks, "Ain't a Damn Thing Change." The song features rapping contributions from G-Eazy and Statik's frequent collaborator and tourmate Joey Badass, and a hook from Enisa.

"It was dope just sending the track with nothing on it to G-Eazy and seeing what he did, then Joey following the theme," Statik told Complex via email. "Especially cuz Joey did the verse a few months ago referencing his gold soon to be plaque [for "Devastated"], and this week it just went platinum. Life imitates art and back around. Enisa brought it up a notch with the chorus she wrote and sang as well. She didn’t even tell me till afterwards that she was in one of Joey's class[es] in high school! Crazy."

You can hear "Ain't a Damn Thing Change" below, and watch out for 8 dropping next month. The album also features the Run the Jewels collaboration "Put Jewels on It."